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Not a lot of people likely saw this coming, except maybe those directly involved with the Tupelo High School boys basketball program.
The Tigers had a rookie head coach in Joe Medcalf. and although the roster featured four seniors in Jonny Park, Cash Wafford, Mike Waters and Luke Foreman, there were also six freshmen in the mix.
However, the Tigers got hot at the right time and won 11 of their final 14 games before ending the season with a hard-fought 64-52 loss to No. 9 Wilson-Henryetta in a Class B Area Tournament contest.
Tupelo finished the season with a 22-8 record, and because of that memorable and mostly unexpected run, Medcalf was named the 2025 Ada News All-Area Boys Basketball Coach of the Year.
“I do think they exceeded expectations. But I also knew our starters were going to be really good,” Medcalf said. “I thought we surprised some people because we never got ranked. and we thought internally that we were at least an area team all along.”
Medcalf said he couldn’t be prouder of his boys squad. They finished as runners-up in the Pontotoc Conference Tournament, were champions of the SRT Tournament and earned Class B District and Regional trophies.
Seven of Tupelo’s eight losses this season were to teams ranked in their respective classes. The other setback was a tough 47-45 loss to host Stratford on a buzzer-beater.
“I thought we had a really good year, to be honest,” Medcalf said.
The first-year head coach said his team was as good as its defensive performance night in and night out. The Tigers also had a dominant post player in Jonny Park, who gave many opponents fits and had scorers all over the floor.
“I thought we did a really good job defensively with our press. We caused a lot of turnovers against teams,” Medcalf said. “We shot it pretty well as a team. I think when you can get that combination, you will win a lot of games.”
Medcalf said he was happy to be the engineer for the Tupelo boys basketball train this season. However, he has decided to move on and has accepted the job as the new boys coach at Konawa High School for the 2025-26 season.
“It was extremely fun. I thoroughly enjoyed it,” he said of his run with the Tigers. “They were a good group of kids to coach.”
Medcalf is the first Tupelo coach to earn the All-Area Coach of the Year honor since Clay Weller in 2005. Medcalf replaced Weller, who stepped down from the head-coaching position to be the assistant coach.
Continue reading...
The Tigers had a rookie head coach in Joe Medcalf. and although the roster featured four seniors in Jonny Park, Cash Wafford, Mike Waters and Luke Foreman, there were also six freshmen in the mix.
However, the Tigers got hot at the right time and won 11 of their final 14 games before ending the season with a hard-fought 64-52 loss to No. 9 Wilson-Henryetta in a Class B Area Tournament contest.
Tupelo finished the season with a 22-8 record, and because of that memorable and mostly unexpected run, Medcalf was named the 2025 Ada News All-Area Boys Basketball Coach of the Year.
“I do think they exceeded expectations. But I also knew our starters were going to be really good,” Medcalf said. “I thought we surprised some people because we never got ranked. and we thought internally that we were at least an area team all along.”
Medcalf said he couldn’t be prouder of his boys squad. They finished as runners-up in the Pontotoc Conference Tournament, were champions of the SRT Tournament and earned Class B District and Regional trophies.
Seven of Tupelo’s eight losses this season were to teams ranked in their respective classes. The other setback was a tough 47-45 loss to host Stratford on a buzzer-beater.
“I thought we had a really good year, to be honest,” Medcalf said.
The first-year head coach said his team was as good as its defensive performance night in and night out. The Tigers also had a dominant post player in Jonny Park, who gave many opponents fits and had scorers all over the floor.
“I thought we did a really good job defensively with our press. We caused a lot of turnovers against teams,” Medcalf said. “We shot it pretty well as a team. I think when you can get that combination, you will win a lot of games.”
Medcalf said he was happy to be the engineer for the Tupelo boys basketball train this season. However, he has decided to move on and has accepted the job as the new boys coach at Konawa High School for the 2025-26 season.
“It was extremely fun. I thoroughly enjoyed it,” he said of his run with the Tigers. “They were a good group of kids to coach.”
Medcalf is the first Tupelo coach to earn the All-Area Coach of the Year honor since Clay Weller in 2005. Medcalf replaced Weller, who stepped down from the head-coaching position to be the assistant coach.
Continue reading...
